Young children, by their nature, take pleasure in opening and closing drawers and cabinet doors and removing the contents of the drawer or cabinet. These drawers and cabinets may contain objects that should not be used by children as playthings, such as jewelry, chemicals that can be harmful if ingested, and other items that should be kept away from children. Several locking devices have been developed and used to lock and latch drawers and cabinets against access by children. See, for example, the disclosures in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,445,451 and 5,626,372.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,626,372 discloses a drawer lock device having a pivotal spring-loaded mounting assembly for a rigid support arm, and for a flexible latching arm and abutment surface, where the support and latching arms are in a first locking position allowing the latching arm to engage a drawer stop member when the drawer is attempted to be opened. The support and latching arms can be pivoted to a second position where the support arm and latching arm assembly are disposed such that the latching arm assembly does not engage the stop member, allowing full opening of the drawer, such as when children are not present.
However, the mechanism disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,626,372 requires a somewhat complicated and relatively expensive pivot structure mounting the support and latch arms to the inside of the front panel of the drawer. Further, over time, the flexible latching element could lose its inherent flexibility characteristics, causing the spring to be replaced.
Additionally, another drawback of the reference latch is that the entire latching or restraining member and its mounting structure must be pivoted to move the restraining member to the unengageable position (FIG. 2). Also, the restraining or latching arm member of the reference device is made of plastic and configured such that it deflects in spring-like fashion upon the application of finger pressure to the release lever. A second spring element is used to control pivotal deployment of the shaft upon which the restraining member is mounted. Also, when the restraining member of the reference device is in its engageable position, it extends horizontally into the drawer a sufficient distance to contact and interfere with the contents of the drawer. This will cause problems when the user attempts to pivot the restraining member from the engageable position, or vice versa.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,445,451 discloses a cabinet and drawer latch with dual flexible prongs having bulbous ends adapted to engage a stop anchor attached to a drawer or cabinet. The flexible prongs extend outward from a downwardly extending base plate, and the base plate is insertable into and retained in a pocket, the pocket firmly attached to the interior front panel of a drawer or cabinet. A detent assembly lodges the base plate firmly in the pocket. The U.S. Pat. No. 5,445,451, however, does not state that the dual flexible prongs and base plate could be easily or manually removed once installed in the pocket. The reference patent states that a narrow tool such as a screwdriver blade would be necessary to disengage the base plate and flexible prongs from the pocket. A further disadvantage of the device disclosed in the U.S. Pat. No. 5,455,451 is that once the base plate and flexible prongs are removed from the pocket, they may be separated from the latch assembly, and eventually lost or discarded. Clearly a single latching assembly having a locking and unlocking feature would be advantageous over the two-piece latch assembly disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,445,451.